Tag Archives: weather

Come on down and get yourself an earthquake; we have plenty here at Earthquakes R Us because this is earthquake country! We have many different faults to choose from just in the Los Angeles area alone. Here is a diagram of our faults. Each line that you see is a fault, we have them in many different colors According to the Southern California Earthquake Data Center, “since these maps show only surface traces of faults, some potentially damaging faults — namely, blind thrust faults, like the one which caused the Northridge earthquake of 1994 — are not shown”. Wow, thanks for that!

Californians are quite used to earthquakes. We are so used to them that we are totally unprepared for the next “BIG ONE”…which has been predicted to happen any day now. Apparently, it has been 300 years since an 8+ richter scale rumbler, so the earth under us is wound up extra tight and ready to unleash all of the pressure that has built up over the centuries. One geologist compared it to being 10 months pregnant! So what should we all do when the big one comes? The best thing to do in an earthquake is to drop, cover and hold on to something immediately. Get under a table or anything sturdy, cover your head and face and HOLD ON!

Go to 72Hours.org to find out how to be prepared for an earthquake(and various other disasters) and get an earthquake preparedness kit at QuakeKare.com. 72hours.org has an ineractive platform that walks you through emergency situations step by step so that you can feel confidently prepared for anything this crazy world has to sling your way. QuakeKare.com has a variety of kits available for home, office, school, car and even one for pets!

As of 6:55pm PST, 10,000 acres are ablaze. A state of emergency has been declared. “Los Angeles County Fire Chief P. Michael Freeman said firefighters are concerned that the blaze could burn to the 101 Freeway and perhaps to the Pacific Ocean”.

This is a pic of the wildfires just a smidgen North of Los Angeles that have burned 3,200 acres so far. One of L.A. Mama’s best friends, who is also the boys babysitter lives in this area (Sunland). We are watching this fire closely and keeping her and all of her neighbors in our thoughts.

The 210 is shut down in both directions between the 118 and the 5. The eastbound 118 is closed at Glenoaks Boulevard. The 3,200-acre blaze has forced 1,200 residents to evacuate. Go to the sidebar at the right for up to the minute feed of Los Angeles Wildfires 2008.

Update at 2:28pm 10/13/08: The Sunland fire has spread to 3,700 acres and there is a now a second fire that has burned 2,000 acres in Porter Ranch. Air quality is poor in the San Fernando Valley. Please stay indoors, but especially keep your children indoors. Their lungs are small and vulnerable.

Click HERE for school closures, mandatory evacuations and road closures.

I was just going about my business, making a salad (organic romaine lettuce, condo grown organic tomatoes, organic red onions from YUMMY.COM and organic Avocados…with low fat Organic Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing)…I had just told Tennessee to take his library books upstairs. California was climbing up the outside of the banister/railing(as usual)…see pic below:

Tennessee reached the landing at the top of the staircase and dropped his load of books then suddenly the condo started shaking…

I said “Did you do that?” then with more intensity, “Are you doing that???”

He said “What? NO! That isn’t because of my books.”

I thought the shaking had stopped and it was just construction or something but then it started again. It kept going and going and going. The staircase was shaking and rattling. I could hear metal and parts of the condo rattling. I quickly noticed that the staircase was only anchored in two places and envisioned the heavy glass block wall crumbling down and said “It’s an earthquake.” with unmistakable urgency. I told Tennessee to get down right now…grabbed California off the ledge and waited for the shaking to stop.

I looked at the clock. It was 11:42am. The shaking lasted for about 15 – 20 seconds. Maybe more. We immediately looked on the USGS Earthquake website and found out that we had just experienced a 5.8 magnitude earthquake (it was later downgraded to a 5.4). We noticed the chandelier swaying again at 11:48. We later found out that was an aftershock measuring at 3.8.

We had at least 30 aftershocks…but we only felt two.

To be honest, I wasn’t that surprised. Sure it caught me off guard and I did freak out a little, but I have been expecting this for a while. After all, we live in EARTHQUAKE COUNTRY and WE PREPARE for things like this; right?

The cell phones weren’t working but the landlines were.

Later in the day, we had a blackout…we still haven’t discovered what caused this as it happened hours after the earthquake.

On the same day that James Hansen, a top NASA scientist and global warming expert, told congress that “we’re toast if we don’t get on a very different path”, much of California was on fire from a rare lightening storm.

Why was this lightening storm so rare? Mainly because it generated 8,000 lightening strikes that started 1,022 wildfires fires last weekend and they are still burning. This lightening storm was called “dry lightening” because any and/all precipitation that fell evaporated before it hit the Earth. Since California is in the middle of a drought, these 8,000 lightening strikes have basically turned California into toast. To the right is a satellite image from NASA to illustrate the severity of the situation.

For those of you who don’t believe in Global Warming…think again. Not only are we in a drought, Southern California had tornadoes in May (RARE)- click HERE to read about them, 8,000 lightening strikes in June (RARE) and we are expecting more lightening today (read the news story HERE). We aren’t the only ones experiencing extreme weather. The Midwest and the South have had some horrible tornadoes and now flooding.

Back to James Hansen; he says that if we don’t curb our use of coal burning power plants which is the main cause of MAN-MADE greenhouse gases. He also says that global warming is happening right now before our eyes. He warned us twenty years ago that the arctic would start to melt and that would be the first sign that we are experiencing global warming. That is happening now and within 5 – 10 years all of the ice will be gone in the summer…mass extinction will occur and there will be a dramatic rise in sea levels. You can read the full article HERE. It is apparent that the entire world needs to find an alternative source of power and it seems as though this is going quite slowly. The obvious choices are solar, wind and water…all of which are free of carbon dioxide emitting gases. It seems as though the common person has no control over this…but there are some things that we can do collectively that will decrease our use of coal fired power plants. How?

Use less electricity. It’s Easy. This is how:

1. Turn off the lights when you don’t need them. 2. Unplug small appliances when they are not in use.3. Turn off your monitor to your computer when not in use.4. Use solar power.5. Use wind power.6. Wash your clothes in cold water.7. Use energy efficient appliances.8. Open the windows instead of using the AC (I know sometimes it is too hot…but sometimes it isn’t)9. Replace your light bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs10. Don’t use any lights during the day. Use the sunlight!

Feel free to post your ideas on how to use less electricity! If you want to know more about Global Warming, get the book, “The Down to Earth Guide to Global Warming”…we highly recommend it!

Since Google will not allow me to post a link for you to buy this book directly, I thought that I would post a picture of this book to show you the cover and authors. You can buy it at Amazon and I have seen it at Barnes & Noble as well as Borders.

First of all, I feel like I need to explain that the only time it usually rains in Southern California is in the winter…between the months of November and February. We hardly ever get thunderstorms but it does happen occasionally. Well today…and remember it is almost JUNE, we had tornadoes, hail, heavy rain, flooding and mudslides. I witnessed my day go from sunny to dark, followed by lightening, thunder and heavy rain.

I thought all we had to worry about were earthquakes and wildfires! Put your seatbelts on everyone,it looks like times are a changin’. Take a look at these pics taken today (from the L.A. Daily News and L.A. Times):

The tornadoes flipped a 30 car freight train and a semi-truck…if you want to see video of these tornadoes click HERE. Please remember that we don’t get tornadoes here…this is strange weather for us.

California is in the process of experiencing a global warming event of crazy proportions! It has already hit Northern California, so Southern California is bracing for the worst. Northern California had wind gusts from 80 – 150 miles per hour today…with torential rain and blizzard conditions in the mountains.

Here in Southern California, in the past two months we have had firestorms, three Santa Ana Wind events, wind gusts up to 50 miles per hour in December on three separate occasions which knocked out power in Los Angeles…and now we are having torential rains after being in a severe drought since 2005. The forecast is predicting urban and foothil flooding, 30 foot ocean waves, wind gusts up to 50 mph some time tonight and mudslides.

According to the Bloomberg Report: “Office towers in San Francisco’s financial district swayed with the wind earlier today, causing some occupants to feel motion sickness. At least three tractor-trailer trucks were overturned by the high winds, CBS 5 reported” Link: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aQI3WxAgwR9c

Did you see “The Day After Tomorrow”? This feels just like that movie! This just doesn’t happen in Southern California. I guess the weather is going to be extreme from now on…it is just an inconvenient truth.